An immense bonfire was crackling and blazing, throwing its rays far and wide through the forest.  Moving around, in various engagements and sports, were about forty men, women, and children, in the fringed, plumed, and brilliantly colored attire of which the Indians were so fond.  Quite a number of them, with bows and arrows, were shooting at a mark, which was made perfectly distinct by the blaze of pitch-pine knots, a light which no flame of candle or gas could outvie.  It was a scene of sublimity and beauty, of peace and loveliness, which no artist could adequately transfer to canvas.

The Cherokees received very cordially the newcomers, took care of their horses, and introduced them to their sports.  Many of the Indians had guns, but powder and bullets were too precious to be expended in mere amusements.  Indeed, the Indians were so careful of their ammunition, that they rarely put more than half as much powder into a charge as a white man used.  They endeavored to make up for the deficiency by creeping nearer to their prey.

Crockett and his men joined these barbarians, merry in their pleasant sports.  Such are the joys of peace, so different from the miseries of demoniac war.  At length the festivities were closed, and all began to prepare to retire to sleep.

The Cherokees were neutral in the war between the whites and the Creek Indians.  It was very important for them to maintain this neutrality strictly, that they might not draw down upon themselves the vengeance of either party.  Some of the Cherokees now began to feel anxious lest a war-party of the Creeks should come along and find them entertaining a war-party of whites, who were entering their country as spies.  They therefore held an interview with one of the negroes, and requested him to inform Mr. Crockett that should a war-party come and find his men in the Cherokee village, not only would they put all the white men to death, but there would be also the indiscriminate massacre of all the men, women, and children in the Cherokee lodges.

Crockett, wrapped in his blanket, was half asleep when this message was brought to him.  Raising his head, he said to the negro, in terms rather savoring of the spirit of the braggadocio than that of a high-minded and sympathetic man: 

“Tell the Cherokees that I will keep a sharp lookout, and if a single Creek comes near the camp to-night, I will carry the skin of his head home to make me a moccasin.”

When this answer was reported to the Indians they laughed aloud and dispersed.  It was not at all improbable that there might be an alarm before morning.  The horses were therefore, after being well fed, tied up with their saddles upon them, that they might be instantly mounted in case of emergence.  They all slept, also, with their arms in their hands.

Just as Crockett was again falling into a doze, a very shrill Indian yell was heard in the forest, the yell of alarm.  Every man, white and red, was instantly upon his feet.  An Indian runner soon made his appearance, with the tidings that more than a thousand Creek warriors had, that day, crossed the Coosa River, but a few leagues south of them, at what was called the Ten Islands, and were on the march to attack an American force, which, under General Jackson, was assembling on another portion of the Coosa River.